The website also claimed it chose the word “because there were multiple occasions on which this word was the one clearly driving people to their dictionary.”

Throughout the year, “surreal” was searched, spiking in certain months, said Webster.

It spiked in March, when the word was used during the Brussels terror attacks. Then it spiked again in July when it was used in the descriptions of the coup attempt in Turkey and in the coverage regarding the Nice attack.

Then the largest spike hit the website in November following the U.S. election.